September 18, 2015

The Highest Calling

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth.

~Deuteronomy 11:18-21

When Jesus ascended into Heaven, He left us with one command, 'Go make disciples of all nations'. We aren't supposed to be undercover Christians, or keep silent about our faith. How could we anyway? If we believe the Truth that Jesus is the only way to restore our relationship with the Loving God and to release us from the burden of sin and guilt, why wouldn't we want to share that with everyone we meet? For it truly IS The Good News!

Still, we don't have to stand on a street corner or travel to an exotic jungle or desert to share this Good News. For many of us, there isn't much opportunity to meet new people or groups of unchurched people. God hasn't given you a pass. In fact, He may have given you the toughest, most important assignment of all -- teaching children, and particularly, your own. Our society places a high value on education. We expect our kids to be at school every day for 180 days per year, but how much time do we spend teaching them the Words of Life that will affect their souls eternally?

When our children are young, it's easy to teach them Bible stories. There are plenty of picture books of Noah, Joseph, Jonah or Adam and Eve. It's tempting to think of these like Cinderella or Goldilocks, but beware of trivializing the deep issues and lessons contained therein. My kids wasted no time cutting to the difficult parts of all those stories and I found myself discussing deep topics like sin, punishment and death much soon than I thought I would have to. But kids want to know the Truth, and because they have faith in you, they will believe what you tell them IS the truth. But be sure to emphasize that what you teach them is from God's Word. Establish that God is the ultimate authority, because the day will come when your child will realize that you are a fallible sinner just like them, and they will no longer automatically accept what you tell them as the truth. In fact, the day will come when they challenge every deeply held belief that you have, so be sure you can defend those beliefs on the firm foundation of God's Word.

Shepherding a child's faith from birth to adulthood is a sacred duty, and a difficult one. It takes a lot of patience and faith. Reciting the Sinner's Prayer is easy, but truly developing a deep faith that can stand up and last against the persistent tide of culture, peer pressure and skepticism is a real challenge. In the end, we sow the seeds of faith that we trust God will grow into the wisdom to receive salvation by trusting in Christ Jesus. As the days get darker, nothing in this world could be as important as reaching children's hearts and souls with the life-giving Word of God and the faith to overcome darkness.

And we win the victory over the world by means of our faith. Who can defeat the world? Only the person who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.